auc report on passenger survey - Air Transport Users Council

7
We believe that significant numbers of passengers might be affected. However, we
receive few complaints about optional fees. (This may be partly because the fees are
for such small amounts that the impact on consumers is not sufficient to prompt them
to contact us.) We therefore included questions about optional fees in our survey.
The results appear to confirm our concerns. Half of passengers (47%) considered that
optional fees were not presented in a clear and easy to understand manner during the
booking process (table 5). This suggests that passengers may find it difficult to
compare the optional fees between different airlines.
When booking a flight, to what extent do you agree or disagree that you find any
additional charges clear and easy to understand, before actually selecting your flights
Strongly disagree
15%
Don’t know
Strongly agree
1%
9%
28%
Tend to agree
Tend to disagree
31%
15%
Neither agree nor disagree
Base: All respondents who are aware of additional charges (1,958) – March 2010
Table 5
Source: Ipsos MORI
In addition, one in six (16%) consumers had mistakenly booked an optional service
that they did not require (table 6). And over half of these had not been able to get their
money back when they pointed this out to the airline. This includes most of the extra
services that airlines tend to charge for. Travel insurance and baggage fees have in the
past often been presented to passengers on an “opt-out” basis (though the Air Services
Regulation – see overleaf – outlaws this practice). This may account for why 6% and
4% respectively of respondents paid for this by mistake. In addition, it is sometimes
not clear from airline websites that seat allocation fees are avoidable - this might
account for the 4% who had booked this by mistake.